“I know it’s only preseason, but…” Famous first words. Some write them, others speak them, almost all think them. But, at some point, almost everybody ignores them. The NFL preseason is where dreams come alive and delusions are enabled. It is a special time where a single performance can confirm the most tenuous biases and create jaded declarations of hope.
In the preseason, most teams’ playbooks consist of basic schemes, and each team plays its second-, third-, and even fourth-string players for significant portions of the games. Many of the players who play in the preseason games won’t even be on any teams’ active roster when the regular season starts. All things considered, it’s not the time to properly assess any player’s performance. Also, exhibition games don’t count toward each team’s records, so by the time the regular season kicks off, anything notable that happened during the preseason is practically forgotten.
If they’re being honest with themselves, most fans and members of the media know not to take players’ achievements during the preseason too seriously. However, every year, regardless of the warning signs, many are victimized by “preseason performance traps,” when the football world interprets a player’s (the majority of the time, a quarterback’s) positive preseason performance as more significant than it is. The phenomenon has been around for decades but has become more prevalent in recent years as social media apps like Twitter allow people to express their thoughts about a game as it’s going on in real time.
Preseason performance traps apply to players and teams of all shapes, sizes, and characteristics, and they occur in many different scenarios. A few examples are listed and described below.
AN “UNDERDRAFTED” ROOKIE WHO PLAYS WELL IN HIS PRESEASON DEBUT
Ryan Mallett, a tall, strong-armed quarterback with a lightning-quick release, was touted as a likely first-round pick throughout his two seasons as the starter at the University of Arkansas, where he threw for close to 7,500 yards and 62 touchdowns. However, during the 2011 Draft, several character issues scared teams from spending a high draft pick on him. He ended up slipping to the third round, where the Patriots grabbed him with the 74th overall pick. A large faction of analysts thought he was drafted significantly lower than his talent suggested.
Mallett took all of New England’s second-half snaps during the Patriots’ first preseason game, a home win over Jacksonville. Facing mostly the Jaguars’ third- and fourth-string defenses, he led New England on four touchdown drives. He finished the game 15-of-21 for 171 yards and a touchdown pass.
Soon after the game, the plaudits started rolling in for the rookie quarterback. NFL Network analyst Bucky Brooks declared that the game proved Mallett was the steal of the draft. ESPN NFL reporter Chris Mortensen relayed that he had already heard from one general manager who was second-guessing himself for not picking Mallett. Fox Sports’ NFL writer Peter Schrager, after having touted Mallett during the 2011 Draft, reiterated that he was “shocked and disturbed” over the fact that the Bengals’ first-round pick, quarterback Andy Dalton, was selected before Mallett. To Schrager, the Arkansas gunslinger slipping to the third round was “MIND BOGGLING.”
Ultimately, Mallett proved to be worth even less than a third-round pick. In two seasons with the Patriots, he completed only one regular-season pass. New England traded him to Houston in 2014. He played four more seasons in the NFL with Houston and Baltimore, but never became a full-time starting quarterback and was out of the league by 2018.
AN “OVERDRAFTED” ROOKIE WHO PLAYS WELL IN HIS PRESEASON DEBUT
With the 16th overall pick in the 2013 Draft, the Buffalo Bills selected Florida State quarterback EJ Manuel. The media reaction was overwhelmingly negative. But unlike the previous example, where people questioned why Ryan Mallett wasn’t drafted high enough, the Bills were criticized for drafting Manuel too high, because he was graded as a second-round prospect on most analysts’ draft boards and was deemed by many to be a “project.” The preseason was Manuel’s first chance to prove the critics wrong.
During Buffalo’s first preseason game, a 44–20 Bills win in Indianapolis, Manuel completed 16-of-21 passes for 107 yards and a touchdown. For some people, it was already enough to justify Manuel’s draft position. “Finally, the Bills have their QB in [EJ Manuel],” tweeted CBS Sports’ Adam Schein. NFL Network analyst and Hall of Fame defensive lineman Warren Sapp also had high praise: “EJ Manuel has command and control of this offense like no rookie I’ve ever seen.” An article on the website Bleacher Report surmised that Manuel “has proven his worth,” and that he looked poised “to show why he was the top quarterback taken in [the draft].”
In the end, Manuel did not turn out to be first-round quality and was not the answer for the Bills. He started 10 games in 2013 but missed six after suffering two separate knee injuries. Once healthy again, he lost his job to Kyle Orton after the first month of the 2014 season and was relegated to the bench the following two years. Buffalo let him go after the 2016 season. He went on to play a few unremarkable seasons in Oakland before retiring in 2019.
A MASSIVELY HYPED ROOKIE WHO LEADS THE TEAM ON A FEW PRESEASON TOUCHDOWN DRIVES
EJ Manuel was a disappointment, but he is never mentioned in the conversation of top draft busts. Usually, the most memorable draft busts are players who fall short of meeting the high expectations thrust upon them after an extraordinary amount of hype surrounded them throughout the NFL Draft process and beyond.
“There was a magic to Rick Mirer’s game. A refreshing, positive energy”
When a quarterback is the subject of persistent fanfare before and after the draft, one single positive performance during a preseason game may be enough, for some, to justify the hype surrounding him. This happened with Seattle Seahawks rookie quarterback Rick Mirer in 1993. His first preseason start elicited a textbook preseason performance trap.
A highly touted prospect out of Notre Dame, Mirer was the second overall pick in the 1993 Draft and was viewed as the key piece to a rebuild of a Seahawks franchise that had finished a dismal 2–14 in 1992. Mirer played in the second half of his first preseason game and started the Seahawks’ second, a home matchup against San Francisco in the Kingdome. Taking advantage of favorable field position resulting from numerous 49er turnovers, Mirer led Seattle on four straight scoring drives. All in all, he went 6-of-12 for 87 yards in limited action and threw two touchdowns.
To most, Mirer’s rookie debut was a nice start, but nothing memorable. But to Seattle Times writer Steve Kelley, it meant much more. Mirer’s performance convinced Kelley of the team’s inevitable future prosperity with the young quarterback. In his game column, Kelley wrote, among other things:
[Mirer] looked as comfortable as a 10-year veteran. He was as tough as oak, quick as a twitching muscle.
There was a magic to Rick Mirer’s game. A refreshing, positive energy.
[The starting quarterback] job should be Mirer’s. Not merely because of what he did last night, but because of what he will do in November of this year and in many autumnal Sundays to come.
Mirer is the best news the Seahawks have had since they drafted [eventual Hall of Fame defensive tackle] Cortez Kennedy.
The curtain on the Seahawks’ future rose last night in the Kingdome.
The Seahawks need a hope for the rest of the 1990s… They need Rick Mirer.
Mirer’s career arc did not reach the heights Kelley intimated. As a rookie, Mirer started every game for Seattle and finished fifth in the AFC in completions and yards. However, he threw 17 interceptions and only 12 touchdowns, and the Seahawks finished 6–10. He never improved. In the four seasons Mirer spent with the franchise, the Seahawks never finished with a winning record. He spent the remainder of his career as a journeyman backup and retired in 2004.
“[Ryan Leaf is] going to be a topic of conversation around here for 15 years”
In the hierarchy of NFL Draft busts, Ryan Leaf may be the crown prince. Drafted right behind Peyton Manning at number two overall by the San Diego Chargers in 1998, Leaf was pegged as a can’t-miss prospect. Stunningly, he became possibly the biggest draft flop in NFL history.
With the excessive amount of hoopla surrounding Leaf throughout the draft process, it was practically impossible not to believe the accolades bestowed upon him. The moment he was drafted, virtually everyone assumed he would be an NFL superstar.
Leaf’s NFL career began promisingly. In his second preseason start, a 41–27 win over the Rams in San Diego, he played the entire first half and was 13-of-22 for 200 yards passing, including a passing touchdown and a rushing touchdown. The showing was enough for San Diego Union-Tribune columnist Nick Canepa to essentially anoint Leaf a future Chargers legend. In his next-day column, Canepa explained that this was a rare occasion he wouldn’t curb his enthusiasm about one game. “If you think we’re making a big deal out of Ryan Leaf, you’re wrong,” he wrote. “He’s going to be a topic of conversation around here for 15 years.” Canepa continued:
With a great quarterback, you always have a chance, which was how it was when [famed Chargers quarterback and Hall of Famer Dan Fouts] walked our turf… Judging by what I saw last night, there’s no reason to believe [the Chargers can’t be serious contenders for a long time]… I’m telling you, we have something special here.
Leaf’s rookie season was a disaster from which he never recovered. He threw two touchdowns and 15 interceptions, and he lost his starting job after nine games. He was released by the Chargers after only two years and was out of the league after just three seasons, never to return. His quick descent to rock bottom, including drug addiction and a prison stint, and his eventual recovery, are well documented. The Chargers eventually gained stability at quarterback in 2006 when Philip Rivers became the starter and held on to that role for 14 straight seasons (where he played the majority of his likely Hall of Fame career).
A NEW QUARTERBACK OF A HISTORICALLY BAD TEAM WHO PERFORMS WELL IN THE PRESEASON
Unlike the Chargers, many teams lack consistency at quarterback for extended periods. The longer a team goes without a capable signal-caller, the more likely the football media and the team’s fans will overextend their acclaim whenever the team has a quarterback who shows even the slightest bit of promise.
The Cleveland Browns have been the 21st century’s poster child for NFL quarterback instability. Since they rebooted the franchise as an expansion team in 1999 (after the original Browns left Cleveland in 1996 and became the Baltimore Ravens) up through 2021, the Browns have been perpetually bad. During this period, they have made the playoffs just twice and have had only three seasons with a winning record. A huge factor in the Browns’ long stretch of futility is their inability to find any consistency at quarterback. Like their win-loss record throughout the past 23 years, the Browns’ record on choosing quarterbacks isn’t very good. Since 1999, the Browns have had 30 starting quarterbacks. At least a handful of them performed well enough in the preseason to lure people into the mistaken belief that change was on the horizon.
“Jake Delhomme [is] just what [the] doctor ordered for [the] Browns.”
After the Browns’ first decade of subpar quarterback play, there was a little bit of optimism in the air about the 2010 season when they brought in Jake Delhomme. He was a 12-year veteran with a solid track record. In the seven years before he arrived in Cleveland, Delhomme led the Carolina Panthers to three playoff berths, including a trip to the Super Bowl in 2004 and an NFC Championship Game appearance in 2006.
In the Browns’ 2010 preseason opener, a 27–24 win in Green Bay, Delhomme, in his only drive, went 6-of-7 for 66 yards, and led the team to a touchdown. About the drive, the AP’s Tom Withers wrote: “One drive: 11 plays, 80 yards in under six minutes. That’s all it took for Jake Delhomme to convince many Cleveland fans that the Browns’ seemingly endless problems at quarterback are history… It was an opening act to behold.” Two games later, in Detroit, Delhomme completed 20-of-25 passes for 152 yards and a touchdown, during which Sports Illustrated’s Peter King tweeted, “Jake’s reborn.” In his Cleveland Examiner column the following day, under the headline “Jake Delhomme just what doctor ordered for ailing Cleveland Browns,” Browns writer Greg Swartz wrote that “a comeback player of the year award isn’t out of the question” for Delhomme, who had the worst season of his career the year before.
It didn’t work out that way. Delhomme suffered a high ankle sprain in Week 1, and didn’t play again until Week 5. He started three more games for the Browns in 2010, but by the end of the year, he lost his starting job. He finished the season with two touchdowns and seven interceptions. The Browns ended up with a 5–11 overall record. Delhomme was released just before the start of the 2011 preseason.
“[With Colt McCoy], Cleveland may have solidified the [quarterback] position for the next [10 years]”
Next man up: Colt McCoy. In 2011, McCoy was the clear-cut starter going into Browns camp. In his rookie season the year before, he started eight games and showed promise.
A prolific four-year starter at quarterback at the University of Texas, McCoy went into the 2010 Draft facing questions about his size (6-foot-1, 215 pounds) and arm strength. As a result, he slipped to the third round, where the Browns grabbed him with the 85th overall pick.
Despite having the starting job in the bag, McCoy still had to prove that he could lead the team to success. It didn’t take long to convince people he was capable. In the Browns first preseason game, McCoy, playing in just three series, went 9-of-10 for 135 yards and threw a touchdown pass. A few days later, ESPN’s Merril Hoge posited that “Cleveland may have solidified the [quarterback] position for the next [10 years].”
Almost a week later, McCoy played even better when he threw three touchdowns at home against the Lions. During the game, ESPN’s John Clayton tweeted that McCoy might be the “most improved QB in football.” A few days after, Cleveland-based writer Branson Wright wrote a blog for the Cleveland Plain Dealer in which he proclaimed that, with McCoy, “the Browns have a potential franchise quarterback for the first time since the ’80s when they had [Browns legendary quarterback] Bernie Kosar” from 1986 to 1993. Later in the preseason, Peter King predicted that McCoy would be one of the league’s five breakout stars of 2011. King also requested his Twitter followers to “mark [his] words” that Browns team president Mike Holmgren would be sold on McCoy by season’s end.
Ultimately, McCoy started 13 regular-season games for Cleveland in 2011. While he wasn’t awful, he failed to convince the Browns brass that he was the team’s long-term answer. After suffering a concussion in Week 14, he missed the rest of the 2011 season. He never started another game for the Browns, who released him after the 2012 season. McCoy has been a journeyman backup in the league ever since.
“Believe it, Browns fans. It’s time to buy into Brandon Weeden”
In 2012, the Browns installed 28-year-old rookie first-round draft pick Brandon Weeden at quarterback, but he struggled. He started 15 games and threw 14 touchdowns and 17 interceptions for a Browns team that went 5–11.
Before the 2013 season, Cleveland hired a new head coach, Rob Chudzinski, who, in turn, brought in Norv Turner as offensive coordinator. Turner, who called the offensive plays for two of the three Cowboys’ Super Bowl winning teams in the ’90s, was considered by many to be an offensive genius. He was pegged as the guy to mold Weeden into a reliable quarterback and transform the Browns offense into a productive one.
Weeden started off the 2013 preseason hot. In six drives, he led the team to three touchdowns and two field goals. Many believed Turner was behind Weeden’s fast start. ESPN’s Ed Werder tweeted about “the Norv Turner impact.” Syracuse.com writer Ryan Talbot chalked up Weeden’s seeming improvement to “the power of Norv.” Writer Andrea Hangst was so impressed with Weeden’s play, she was convinced Weeden was a changed player. “Believe it, Browns fans: Weeden is living up to his first-round billing,” she wrote in a Bleacher Report article titled “It’s Time to Buy into Brandon Weeden After Another Dominant Preseason Outing.”
None of this proved to be true. Weeden battled injuries but still struggled when he was healthy. By the eighth week of the season, he permanently lost his job. The Browns finished the season at 4–12, and, soon thereafter, Turner was fired, along with the rest of the coaching staff. Weeden was released three months later.
“[DeShone Kizer] is the future for the Cleveland Browns… [He] is the next generation of QB”
In 2017, DeShone Kizer was the odd man out of a first round of a draft that included quarterbacks Mitch Trubisky, Patrick Mahomes, and Deshaun Watson. A 21-year-old signal-caller out of Notre Dame, Kizer, along with Trubisky and Watson, were projected to be first-round picks during the months leading up to the draft, but at some point Mahomes surpassed him, and Kizer slipped to the second round, where the Browns grabbed him.
Kizer was 6-foot-4 and 235 pounds, quick on his feet, and had great arm strength. Critics were intrigued by his tools. After a few positive performances during the preseason, many were bullish on his future. Former NFL wide receiver Nate Burleson, one of the hosts of the NFL Network TV show Good Morning Football, fawned over Kizer throughout the preseason. “[Kizer] is the future for the Cleveland Browns,” he said. “[He] is the next generation of QB.” Burleson also predicted that Kizer would lead the Browns to seven wins. CBS Sports analyst London Fletcher was also all-in on Kizer. “When I watch him, he’s a special quarterback,” Fletcher tweeted just before the start of the 2017 regular season.
Kizer started in Cleveland’s final preseason game and played well enough to win the starting job. Statistically he wasn’t great, but he made enough eye-popping plays to put himself on the radar. The day after that game, Steven Ruiz, a columnist for the USA Today website For the Win, published an article titled “The Browns’ 18-year search for a quarterback is finally over.” In it, he wrote, “At long last, the Cleveland Browns have real hope at the quarterback position.” While he admitted that Kizer had a long way to go, he surmised that he was not the same “pretender” as every other touted prospect that had come to Cleveland during the past two decades with franchise quarterback aspirations. “This time it feels different,” he wrote. “This time it is different.”
It was only different in that it was worse. Kizer won the starting job and started 15 games, throwing 11 touchdowns and 22 interceptions. The Browns did not win a single game in 2017, becoming only the third team in NFL history to finish a season winless and only the second to finish 0–16. Kizer was traded to Green Bay a few months after the season ended and was cut after the following season. Through 2021, he has yet to make another active NFL roster.
THE PHYSICALLY GIFTED, BUT INCONSISTENT, QB WHO HAS PLAYED WELL IN THE PRESEASON
Leading up to the 2014 Draft, some draftniks were impressed with Virginia Tech quarterback Logan Thomas, and particularly with his physical tools. But even though the 6-foot-6, 250-pound quarterback was blessed with tremendous speed, arm strength, and athleticism, he was only considered to be a mid- to low-round draft prospect. While he sometimes showed flashes of brilliance during his college career, he was inconsistent, and struggled with his accuracy. With his freakish physical attributes, many suggested he would be a better prospect as a tight end. However, the Arizona Cardinals and its head coach and renowned quarterback mentor, Bruce Arians, disagreed. Arizona drafted Thomas in the fourth round with the intention of having him play quarterback.
Thomas’s potential was on full display during his first preseason game. Playing the entire second half of Arizona’s 32–0 win over Houston, Thomas completed a combined 11-of-12 passes for 113 yards and threw a touchdown and no interceptions. ESPN’s Ron Jaworski called him the best of the 2014 rookie quarterbacks he had seen. Rivals.com college football analyst Mike Farrell proudly declared that he was “one of the few who still thinks [Thomas] can be very very good.” On NFL.com, media personality Adam Schein wrote:
Some draft gurus and members of the media elite think Logan Thomas has no future in the NFL at quarterback. Those folks are wrong. On the other hand, my guy Phil Simms—who said on our CBS draft preview show that Thomas was the true QB sleeper in this class—is oh so right.
The week after the first preseason game, Arians was asked about the critics who had said Thomas should play tight end. “They’re eating a lot of crow this week,” he replied. “So that’s fun.”
Thomas made the Cardinals roster as a quarterback in 2014. He played in two regular-season games and completed one pass. While Thomas may have shined in a few of his preseason appearances as a rookie, he never could impress on the practice field, as the same inconsistency issues, particularly with his accuracy, continued to plague him. He was released in 2015 and didn’t make another active roster until Buffalo signed him in November 2016, after he had switched to tight end. The new position has served him well. Thomas has played tight end for Buffalo, Detroit, and most recently Washington. In 2020, he had his best season, catching six touchdowns. In 2021, Thomas signed a three-year contract extension with Washington worth $24 million.
A SECOND-YEAR QB WHO HAD A TERRIBLE ROOKIE YEAR, BUT PLAYED GREAT THE FOLLOWING PRESEASON
While Logan Thomas found new life as a tight end, a few years earlier Blaine Gabbert was in his second season trying to prove himself worthy as a quarterback.
In 2013, Gabbert, the Jaguars’ 10th overall pick in the 2011 Draft, was coming off a dreadful rookie season and was fighting for his starting job. But he had spent the off-season trying to improve. This included time with new Jaguars head coach Mike Mularkey, who tweaked his mechanics. Gabbert’s outlook seemed positive after his first two preseason games in which he completed 18-of-26 passes for 174 yards, three touchdowns, no interceptions, and a passer rating of 126.1. During the second game, after Gabbert’s second touchdown pass, CBS Sports’ Pete Prisco tweeted, “Where are all the Gabbert rippers?” To which former Jaguars All-Pro offensive lineman and 2022 Hall of Fame inductee Tony Boselli replied, “It doesn’t fit their script!” Peter King was also impressed. “Your magic spell is working, Mike Mularkey,” he wrote in his weekly “Monday Morning Quarterback” column in SI.com later in the week.
Turns out, Gabbert was still Gabbert. The Jaguars won two games in 2012. Gabbert contributed 10 unmemorable starts before succumbing to injury. He was released by the Jaguars in 2014. That was essentially the end of his career as a first-string quarterback in the NFL.
A TEAM THAT UNDERWENT A MAJOR OFF-SEASON ROSTER REVAMP, THEN DOMINATED THE PRESEASON
Teams that make a significant number of important roster moves in the off-season are prime candidates to fall victim to a preseason performance trap. When such a team looks sharp and improved during its preseason games, the roster overhaul is usually cited as the primary reason why. One example of a team that followed this script is the 2015 Philadelphia Eagles.
After posting identical 10–6 records in his first two seasons (2013–2014), Eagles head coach Chip Kelly added head of football operations (i.e., general manager) to his title. In his new role, Kelly made a bevy of unpopular off-season moves. A few of them involved trading some of the team’s most prominent players, including running back LeSean McCoy and quarterback Nick Foles. To replace them, Kelly brought in veterans Sam Bradford and 2014 rushing champion DeMarco Murray.
With the new personnel, Kelly’s high-tempo offense was unstoppable in their first three preseason games, all wins, as the Eagles scored 115 points. In the third game, a 39–26 victory over the Packers, Bradford was 10-of-10 with 121 yards passing and three touchdowns. ESPN Fantasy Football expert Matthew Berry was watching the game, and was very high on Chip Kelly’s offense. “The Eagles are gonna be awesome this year,” he tweeted. “I want as many [Philadelphia] players as I can get [on my Fantasy Football teams].”
The bullishness was palpable in the City of Brotherly Love. “Get excited about this Eagles team,” wrote Andrew Porter on CBS Philadelphia’s website. “You’re allowed.” Longtime Philadelphia sportswriter and TV analyst Ray Didinger was also amped up. “I’m telling you—if you want to put this team in the conversation of a team that can go all the way, I mean right now, I’m not gonna tell you no,” he said on the 94WIP Morning Show in Philadelphia.
Some couldn’t wait for the regular season to start. Former Eagles linebacker and Philadelphia radio personality Ike Reese was literally salivating: “My mouth is watering, waiting for this offense to take the field Monday night [for the Eagles regular-season opener] in Atlanta.” (Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania) Morning Call writer Nick Fierro was amazed by the team’s cohesiveness after Kelly had brought in a considerable number of new players. “The chemistry on this squad is almost as scary as the talent,” he wrote. “The Eagles should be good for 12 [wins], an NFC East Division title and at least one home game in the playoffs, if not two.”
Unfortunately for the Eagles and their fans, preseason success did not translate to the regular season. The team started off 1–3, and the offense that was “high-powered” in the warm-up games sputtered all season long. They finished 7–9 and missed the playoffs, and Kelly was fired in the second to last week of the regular season.
LET’S GET CYNICAL
Chronic cynics can be a drag. But if there were ever a time to be a skeptic, it would be during the NFL preseason. Legacies rarely begin or end during an exhibition game. The highlights, the performances, and the narratives all vanish as soon as the regular season starts. The games are hardly ever replayed, the moments are scarcely relived, and the traps are practically impossible to avoid. The only real certainty of an NFL season is that a fair amount of people will be thinking the same thing by the end of September: “It was just preseason, I should have known better.”